SAPPHIRE Vapor-X 100351VXSR Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition 3GB 384-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card

Pros: It does have supposedly better specs than a GTX680 for a lil' less money

Cons: It performs pretty poorly in most of my games, Bioshock Infinite in ultra settings drops some serious frames most of the time, the first day I installed it, my PC crashed a couple times and I was getting a lot of screen flashes playing League of Legends as well as Trials Evolutions. Overall, not very happy, based on the price-range of this card and the reviews I've seen out there, this should be a premium GPU and performing much better than it is, so I am very disappointed.
I decided to give AMD a chance since their cards seem substantially cheaper than most GTX680's out there yet based on several reviews they should perform better than the 680 in more games than not, I however find catalyst to be rather annoying and the card just does not perform like it is supposed to.

Other Thoughts: I might just spend a little bit more money and go for the 4GB GTX680. Nvidia has done me right until now, so although the specs say the opposite, a 680 should perform as it states.

Pros: This video card will plow through anything that you throw at it!! I have had zero issues with this card. I have OC'd it as far as 1100/1600MHZ on core and memory, but have backed it off to 1175/1585MHz respectively for consistent gameplay, as I had 1 crash at the previous overclock. Nothing really bad to say as it runs in the high 60C's temp wise during gameplay. Fans are a bit noisey, but the trade off is a cool running video card. I recommend this for anyone interested in a powerful 7970 card!!!

Cons: None really

Other Thoughts: I believe this is the best video card in the sub $500 market IMO.

Pros: First of all, this card is beautiful in aesthetic, all the way down to the glossy fans, nicely placed heat pipes, and LEDs. It's very pleasing to look at through the case window.

While gaming, this card stays cool and quiet at 60C under full load in my Antec 1100 case with the boost enabled. It rips through all games with ease and performs above the GTX 680 in almost all major titles. . . and that's without increasing the speeds even more. This thing can overclock like a beast, even though it's already at 1050/1500. It can be easily pushed up to 1150/1600 without touching the voltages and keeping a good load temperature. At max settings with 1920x1080p resolution in most games this thing almost keeps up with my friend's Titan (however, his Titan starts to shine at higher resolutions).


Well worth the ~$450 price tag with rebate and 3 free games. I might add a second one some day.

Cons: None

Pros: Runs everything as good as I expected it to maybe a bit better. stays cool even when bitcoining. bitcoining is ridiculous though dont buy this to bitcoin 460 Hash majigures a second oooo wow 1 bitcoin every 20 days holly cow you will be so rich. why do people do this? lol im not ripping on its bitcoin abilities as any gaming graphics card isn't going to bitcoin well I dont care what you say they wont NVidia amd they all do it the same.

Cons: my asic quality is horrible and it doesn't like voltage increases at all

Pros: It's incredibly powerful and the 1GHz really makes this card sizzle. I can run everything pretty much everything on HIGH/ULTRA with no issues.

The card can be OC'ed to be comparable with a HD7990.

Easy installation. No issues with installing it in my full-sized tower.

Cons: Price - wow, it was expensive when I purchased it then and it's still kinda expensive now.

Other Thoughts: After almost 9 mo's, I am thoroughly satisfied with this GPU. It has performed like the true tyrant it is.

I am gonna pick up another when they drop in price and cross-fire 'em up. Probably OC them, too.

Pros: Plays anything that you want it to. I'll be good for at least another year, at that point I may just get another one of these and go Crossfire.

Cons: None

Pros: Don't know where to start, but this card is definitely amazing!
1: Comes with 2 really awesome free games... come on really(in a good way)?
2: OCing = superb... though i havent messed with voltages, I've reached 1235mhz core clock and 7000 mhz memory clock. That's on core voltages...
3: Coil whine, spoil whine... never heard of such a thing. Even at 95% fan usage, I dont hear any high pitch whines, just obnoxious fans. And that's because they're at 95%... duhhhh
4: Looks nice and installed very easily
5: 489.99 with tax -20 MIR card. This easily beats any 680? Don't mean to be pretentious but, cant beat the price for performance here.
5: shall I keep going?
* As for frame rates in certain game, I achieved 60 fps with ultra settings on my 47" Samsung HDTV (1920x1080) while playing Bioshock: Infinite. I also achieve the same rates for Crysis 3, however, once i changed settings to very high, i only got to 30-40 fps :/. Nothing to complain about really, Crytech made the dang game that way :).

Cons: I suppose you could say its loud, extremely energy INefficient, and more than you would ever need, but why the hell would you when you're buying a 489.99$ gpu... I guess what I am saying is that: you would not be buying this gpu if you were not asking for such things.

Other Thoughts: I would not x-fire just yet until AMD improves their drivers. Also in the next year or so, both AMD and Nvidia will be coming out with newer cards which i believe are Sea Islands (refresh of 7xxx series) and Maxwell (new architechture based off of GK110). So if your in the market at the moment, and you still are not sure if you want to upgrade, I would say wait. However, if you don't have a gpu at all, i would say go ahead and buy it, because you have nothing to lose :)

Pros: None. Defective.

Cons: Defective card.

Other Thoughts: Basically a lottery if you get a working card.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Customer,

Sorry that you have received a defective card, please contact newegg customer service they will help you process your defective DOA card for replacement right away.

Pros: Doesn't matter what you throw at this thing, it's going to take it like a champ. I have no clue where some of this bad reviews are coming from, the price/performance ratio on this thing is absolutely incredible.

If you're like me, and overclocking isn't really your cup of tea, grab this thing that has been OC tested and ready. I promise you won't be disappointed.

Sapphire, I know you guys read these, just wanted to let you know I'll be recommending your products every chance I get!

Cons: None so far. Just beware the card is pretty big, but at this caliber, that's expected.

Other Thoughts: If you got this/bought this before Blood Dragon came out, you'll get an email sometime at the beginning of may with a code for it. Just a heads up for the gamers out there :)

Pros: - It looks nice
- It does have amazing cooling

Cons: Horrible quality. First card had a 63.4% ASIC and terrible coil whine and couldn't OC past 1150 despite it being a premium version of the 7970 that is SUPPOSED to be high-binned. Since the OC was so pathetic I decided to run it at stock settings and it STILL died within 1 month of use. The replacement card they sent me was USED card that had a warped PCB and slightly bent I/O bracket straight out of the box, for which I demanded another replacement in identical physical condition to my original card, and sapphire REFUSED!! Saying the PCB warpage is NORMAL!!! What a load of garbage. The second card had even WORSE coil whine and couldn't clock past 1100Mhz!!!! The fans are extremely loud and they rattled around at certain speeds on BOTH cards. The 2nd card had an ASIC quality of 56.3%, which is one of the worst I have ever seen.

These cards are very poorly designed - they have extremely heavy coolers and NO backplate or other support to keep the PCB straight. It will warp within just 2 weeks of hanging in your case, unless you lay your PC sideways.

The RMA process is awful too. Takes at least 3-4 weeks with very poor communication. They do not notify you that they've received your card and they do not give you any sort of status updates on your RMA unless you pester them for it.

Other Thoughts: If it were a baseline reference 7970 with a sub-$380 price tag, I could MAYBE understand the horrible ASIC quality, coil whine, and terrible over clocking. But this is a premium 7970 GHz Edition with a custom PCB and custom cooler with a premium price tag , and these things are unacceptable in a card like this.

If you want a trash-quality card, settle for Sapphire. If you want anything with a decent amount of quality, look almost anywhere else.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Customer,

Sorry to hear about the problem you have with this card, regarding the ASIC score, when windows calculate this score it uses a combination of different components in your to make this calculation, some comes out higher some lower, but the basic range should be some where between 65% to 75% from our experience with these cards. Did you try to contact the RMA department again? I am sure there is something they can do if your replacement unit continuously showing problems.